Real musical riches: Thea Musgrave’s major operatic statement, Mary, Queen of Scots returns to the UK after an embarrassing period of neglect

Musgrave: Mary, Queen of Scots – Heidi Stober – English National Opera, 2025 (Photo: Ellie Kurttz)

Musgrave: Mary, Queen of Scots; Heidi Stober, Alex Otterburn, Rupert Charlesworth, John Findon, director: Stewart Laing, conductor: Joana Carneiro; English National Opera at the London Coliseum
Reviewed 18 February 2025

Strong performances from soloists and in the pit bring out the real musical and dramatic riches of Musgrave’s unfairly neglected opera, though the rather cut-price production does the work few favours.

In the 1970s, Scottish Opera commissioned a sequence of four contemporary operas from significant Scottish composers. These were large-scale company commissions, presented in main seasons. Whatever the operas themselves, this was a gesture of confidence. In fact, works like Iain Hamilton’s Catiline and Thomas Wilson’s Confessions of a Justified Sinner deserve to be seen again, and this is particularly true of Thea Musgrave’s Mary, Queen of Scots. Premiered by Scottish Opera at the 1977 Edinburgh Festival, the production was toured around the UK and there was a performance in Germany. Musgrave’s husband, Peter Mark, conducted it in the USA in 1978 (when it was recorded) and 1981, and there have been later productions in Germany and the USA. In 2024, Oper Leipzig performed the work in a new production [see Tony’s review]. But it has been resolutely absent from British stages.

English National Opera‘s two performances of Thea Musgrave‘s Mary, Queen of Scots on 15 and 18 February 2025 at the London Coliseum fill a profoundly embarrassing lacuna. Musgrave (born 1928) travelled from the USA and was present at both performances. The performances had originally been billed something like a concert staging, but a co-production with San Francisco Opera meant that we were presented with a full, albeit spartan staging by designer and director Stewart Laing.

We caught the second performance on 18 February 2025 with Heidi Stober as Mary, Alex Otterburn as Moray, Rupert Charlesworth as Darnley, John Findon as Bothwell, Barnaby Rea as David Riccio, Darren Jeffery as Cardinal Beaton, Alastair Miles as Lord Gordon, Ronald Samm as the Earl of Ruthven and Jolyon Loy as the Earl of Morton. The conductor was Joana Carneiro.

Musgrave: Mary, Queen of Scots – closing scene – English National Opera, 2025 (Photo: Ellie Kurttz)

The definitive musical Mary, Queen of Scots must remain Donizetti’s romantic heroine. But there was more than one historical Mary, and Musgrave is interested not in romance but in politics, the turbulent few years of Mary’s (ultimately disastrous) direct rule in Scotland. Musgrave, writing her own libretto based on a play by Amalia Elguera (librettist of Musgrave’s previous opera, The Voice of Ariadne) adjusts history somewhat, so that she can focus on Mary and her troubled relationships with three unruly men – James Stewart, Earl of Moray (her illegitimate half-brother), Henry Stuart, Earl of Darnley (her husband), and James Hepburn, Earl of Bothwell (in the opera he assaults her, in history it remains controversial whether she was accomplice or unwilling victim).

The opera takes place in three acts, spread over five different time periods though the production blurred these and it seemed to take place as one continuous thread. The longest act is the first (nearly 50 minutes) and the shortest the third (25 minutes), but for some reason the decision was taken to place the interval after Act Two which gave us a first half of around 100 minutes and a second half of around 25 minutes.

Musgrave is an experienced operatic composer, she has written around a dozen operas and music theatre pieces of which Mary, Queen of Scots is the fifth. In the work, Musgrave eschews the idea of grand opera, she does not follow Britten’s example in the way he intertwines the private events with public operatic spectacle in Gloriana (though that opera’s reputation in the 1970s was only just returning). Yes, Act One of Musgrave’s opera concludes with courtly dances with dialogue over, whilst Act Three features a poignant lullaby for Prince James (the future James I & VI). But Musgrave eschews grand operatic gesture for its own sake. The work begins quietly and subtly (the audience did not seem to understand that the opera had actually started), and it was the interplay of character that interests Musgrave. Central to the piece is the substantial role of Mary. This is a lyric role (the first Mary, Catherine Wilson, sang Ellen Orford, the Merry Widow and the Marschallin for Scottish Opera) and a lot of Musgrave’s writing is surprisingly spare, thinning the orchestra down.

Musgrave: Mary, Queen of Scots – Heidi Stober & cast in the Act One party scene – English National Opera, 2025 (Photo: Ellie Kurttz)

Listening to the opera, I was very much aware of Musgrave’s skill/talent/genius with the orchestra, there was a lot of magic. It might be quite a shouty opera (Mary’s relations with Moray, Darnley and Bothwell tend to be argumentative) but is is not a 1970s blaring brass type piece. This was intelligently written for real singers, and Musgrave’s lines seemed to be expressively singable, yet complex.

Stewart Laing’s production was, frankly, a disappointment and if it wasn’t for the compelling individual performances we might have preferred a concert staging after all. It was a modern dress, black box production. Laing’s costumes (associate costume designer Mady Berry) relied rather heavily on anoraks. Mary’s Scotland in the period was a nasty brutish and violent place, and Laing’s design gave us a nasty, brutish modern day ‘state’. What was problematic was that there was no distinction, either between Protestant and Catholic, or between Lord and commoner. Laing’s personen regie was fine indeed, it is just a shame that his designs somewhat obfuscated the politics the opera is about, as well as being, well, boring.

The set was a black box with rails at the front and a marquee. The railings doubled as balcony space and cage, to interesting effect though we rather wondered what the view from the front stalls was like. Workmen were putting the marquee up before the opera started and it was finally finished as Act Two ended. A conceit that almost suggested that the placing of the interval was related to marquee building rather than real dramatic purposes. The problem was that the marquee was largely redundant, its gaunt, stripped back frame in Act Three worked perfectly well, and that the busy-ness with the actors and chorus members erecting it suggested that Laing wanted extra stage business to ‘cheer up’ the action. This wasn’t needed, thanks to a group of compelling performances from a superb cast of singing actors.

Musgrave: Mary, Queen of Scots – Jolyon Loy, Alex Otterburn, Ronald Samm – English National Opera, 2025 (Photo: Ellie Kurttz)

Heidi Stober was a transfixing Mary. There was nothing historical about this Mary, nor was there anything hysterical. She was trying to be her own woman in a rough male-dominated world. Central to the role were three major solos, one each act, where it was essentially Stober, a few instruments in the orchestra and us. Each time, Laing brought Stober forward and her incarnation as the heroine was mesmeric. There was power there, but subtlety too, and Stober drew attention to the essential lyricism of the role as well as Mary’s headstrong nature. I certainly hope that Stober is scheduled to return to the role when the production moves to San Francisco, this was a performance that deserves wider currency.

Around this, were a series of strong male portraits with the opera being structured around Mary’s dramatic (and sometimes shouty) interactions. Alex Otterburn made Moray a slimy, untrustworthy apparatchik, always out for his own gain and perpetually feeling that his illegitimate status has robbed him of the crown and led him to have to support Mary. The entire opera consisted of us watching him, usually successfully, manipulate her and he seems to win at the end. But Musgrave anticipates Moray’s assassination, so the opera ends with his final comeuppance.

John Findon represented the opposite, the powerful border Lord, a soldier with a directness which was both appealing and threatening. Findon has the physique du role, with a physical impressiveness which contributed to his powerful effect allied to Findon’s wonderfully clarion voice. This Bothwell was not a nice man, nor a civilised one, though you could understand his appeal. And yes, we have to watch him rape her (discreetly done behind a screen of his followers), though the aftermath on Stober’s Mary was devastating. And, of course, Otterburn’s Moray assumes that she was complicit.

Musgrave: Mary, Queen of Scots – John Findon, Heidi Stober – English National Opera, 2025 (Photo: Ellie Kurttz)

The third man in Mary’s life was different again. Rupert Charlesworth’s Darnley was a complete idiot, an effete drunkard whose only thought was pleasure and who was easily manipulated. Bothwell’s henchmen, the impressive Ronald Samm and Jolyon Loy as Ruthven and Morton, talk up Darnley’s jealousy of David Riccio (Barnaby Rea), an entertainer turned secretary, leading to Riccio’s murder which leads to the climactic finale of Act Two.

Barnaby Rea made Riccio a strong presence, helped by his visually striking outfit, despite the relatively small nature of the role. And at one point, his entertainment included backing vocals from Mary’s female attendants, the four Marys (Jenny Stafford, Monica McGee, Felicity Buckland, Sian Griffiths) who travelled with Mary from France.

Alastair Miles was Lord Gordon, a man who kept cropping up and speaking sense, telling Mary not to trust and getting ignored. Miles gave a strong performance but Laing gave us few visual clues as to who this man was and why he was always wearing a rucksack. Darren Jeffery made an imposing Cardinal Beaton, but alas he only had the opening scene.

The chorus gave a fine performance though, inevitably given the production’s restricted budget, Laing’s handling of them was schematic. In the pit, Joana Carneiro drew a superb performance from the ENO Orchestra, encouraging them to fine the sound down and create a subtle web of sound to complement the voices. It is to Carneiro’s credit that the singers never seemed to have any balance problems and that diction was excellent. We barely needed the surtitles.

Musgrave: Mary, Queen of Scots – Barnaby Rea, Rupert Charlesworth, Alex Otterburn – English National Opera, 2025 (Photo: Ellie Kurttz)

Critical reaction to the production has been mixed and I agree that Laing’s staging is disappointing and, at times, unhelpful. But what Joana Carneiro, the soloists and orchestra bring out is the real richnesses available in this opera. The worry is that this production will put off other companies. That ENO will feel that is has ticked the box, whilst other hard-pressed British companies will barely give the work as second glance.

The BBC Proms have featured quite a bit of Musgrave’s orchestra music over the years, and some of her concertos are instrumental operas, as well as music from her opera Simón Bolívar in 1995, but they have never featured a complete opera. Isn’t it about time that lack was remedied.